Patriot Viper DDR3 2000MHz 2x2GB Review

Introduction:

Are you looking to upgrade your system soon? Have you been working with DDR2 RAM with all of your builds including your current one? Maybe you are looking to see what all the rage about DDR3 RAM with it's lower power consumption and higher frequencies is. Well, if you are looking for some of the highest frequencies out there for your RAM, then you are in luck, Patriot has just released their newest Viper DDR3 2x2GB kit that clocks in at 2000MHz! I am very interested to see exactly how well this RAM is going to be able to perform at these high speeds, and to see if we can get the kit any higher than it's rated to run. Enough talk, let's see what this stuff looks like.

Closer Look:

The packaging of the Patriot Viper DDR3 2000MHz kit looks very similar to the other RAM kits that are out on the market, as it comes in a molded plastic packaging that will not only keep it in place, but add some protection during the shipping process.The front of the package is very busy looking. It has a picture of one of the Patriot Viper DDR3 memory modules installed in a motherboard, showing you what it will look like. There is also the Patriot logo up in the top right hand corner of the package. Under this, the slogan "Extreme Performance - Low Latency" appears, which suggests that this memory is going to give you the benchmarking numbers to be proud of, while operating at lower latency than you are acustomed to. There is a green box below this on the right hand side of the package that shows you some of the specifications of the Viper DDR3 kit from Patriot, such as PC3-16000, 2000MHz and 4GB (2x2GB). Under the Viper Series logo, you are going to see that the memory kit is EPP 2.0 ready. When you take a look at the back of the packaging, you'll notice the two memory modules and how bright green they really are. They are arranged in the package so that you are going to be able to see both the front and the back of the modules.

When you open up the package and remove the Patriot DDR3 2000MHz 2x2GB kit, you'll see how light weight and brightly colored they are. They have a very distinctive heatsink installed on both of the sticks. These allow the heat that is generated, while they are in use, to be quickly dissipated away the modules to help prevent overheating. Overheating will ultimately result in burnt up sticks, leaving them dead and useless. The front of the sticks is where you find the Patriot logo printed to show off who makes them. When you flip them over and look at the back, you are going to see the DDR3 badge in the upper right hand corner, and a sticker that gives you vital details about the sticks opposite to the DDR3 logo. This sticker shows the model number and that the sticks are rated at 2000MHz and can run at 9-9-9-24 timings with 2.0V going through them. It also tells you that the total capacity is 4GB in a 2x2GB combination.

The RAM sinks that are installed on the Patriot Viper DDR3 2x2GB 2000MHz kit are very interesting looking. They are colored a very bight and brilliant lime green, allowing you to notice exactly what type of RAM you have installed in your computer. The RAM sinks are installed very tightly and they will not budge when wiggled during removal of the RAM from the motherboard. Taking a look at the way they are attached from the different angles helps explain this. They are attached to the memory modules located on the sticks themselves, which will help with the heat transfer. In addition to the green coloring, the heatsinks use what is called ACC technology. What is that you ask? Well, let me tell you. ACC stands for Aluminum Copper Composite, which means that the heatsinks use copper and aluminum to form an effective heatspreader. The copper is on the inside and carries the heat away from the modules, while the outer layer is made of aluminum and has many small ridges on the outside surface to increase the surface area available and dissipate the heat generated by these modules at 2.0 volts.

Now that we know what the memory looks like, I think it's time to see exactly what they are made up of and what the specifications of these sticks are.